How Con Air Transformed Nicolas Cage from Strange Character Actor to Combustible Action Star

https://consequence.net/2022/06/nicolas-cage-con-air-good/

Jordan Blum
June 6, 2022 | 9:30am ET

Nicolas Cage may be the most unlikely action star of his generation. After all, he’s rarely — if ever — been conventionally attractive, overtly stoic, or intimidatingly buff and domineering. On the contrary, his oddball look and acting style fluctuate so broadly and frequently that he’s become a beloved meme legend. With dozens of action titles now under his belt, however, he’s certainly earned the title, and it was the lovably ludicrous Con Air that first charted that path.

Released in early June 1997, Con Air was produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, who’d already established himself as a stylistic heavyweight with movies such as Top Gun, Bad Boys, Crimson Tide, and The Rock. Although the same couldn’t be said for fledgling screenwriter Scott Rosenberg and first-time director Simon West, they’d collectively go on to create adrenaline-fueled hits like Gone in 60 Seconds, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, Venom, and The Expendables 2.

Clearly, Con Air had the correct creative team behind it (especially since Rosenberg drew inspiration and authenticity from witnessing actual in-flight inmate transportation, as well as from visiting Folsom State Prison with Cage, Bruckheimer, and West). As for Cage — and speaking of 1996’s The Rock — he was just starting to shift into his career as a tough guy protagonist. In fact, The Rock, Con Air, and 1997’s Face/Off are typically seen as the trifecta of this transition.

Previously, Cage was known primarily for being a bizarre and meek character in comedies, dramas, thrillers, and romances (such as Rumble Fish, Trapped in Paradise, Wild at Heart, Moonstruck, Raising Arizona, and perhaps most infamously, Vampire’s Kiss).

While Michael Bay’s The Rock saw Cage kicking butt, dishing out one-liners, and ultimately saving the day, his role as FBI Special Agent Dr. Stanley Goodspeed was relatively subservient and — for lack of a better way to put it — normal. He was reluctantly thrown into the chaos by circumstance, not courageous choice, and he relied on Sean Connery’s SAS Captain John Patrick Mason to lead the way and confront the baddies.

John Woo’s Face/Off definitely showcased more of Cage’s trademark dramatics and weirdness, but he was playing the villain (Castor Troy), so it really doesn’t count. Thus, it’s Con Air that originally drove him to mix emblematic eccentricities with the traditional genre trope(s) of a virtuous family man fighting his way out of a perilous situation to reunite with loved ones, rescue innocent bystanders, and redeem himself for past transgressions.

As paroled Army Ranger Cameron Poe, Cage’s quest to thwart a ragtag group of terrorist convicts from hijacking a plane so that he can finally become an honorable husband and father is ridiculously hazardous. Yet, the movie wonderfully offsets its genuine tenderness and spectacle with a generous amount of silliness — the accent, the hairstyle, the stuffed bunny for his daughter, Casey — that’s impossible not to love.

It’s worth noting that Cage wasn’t just an improbable pick for Poe because of the types of films he’d done and people he’d played, but also because of the quality of them. Specifically, he’d just won multiple awards (from the Oscars, Golden Globes, and SAG, among others) for his harrowing performance as Ben Sanderson in 1995’s Leaving Las Vegas.